Z.O.E.: In The Director's Seat

Noriaki Okamura sits down with IGNPS2 to discuss big robots, anime, and the end of Evangelion.

By IGN Staff

There's no doubt that Noriaki Okamura loves his job. After all, he's currently in charge of Colin Williamson, IGN

Z.O.E., one of the tastiest giant robot games to hit the scene since the original Virtual On, and his team has mastered the seemingly untamable beast that is the PlayStation 2. The bordering-on-cherubic director accompanies each Z.O.E. demo with a never-ending stream of rapid-fire commentary, and it's obvious that he's having a damn good time crafting his own sci-fi universe. Okamura-san took a slice out of his schedule to sit down with IGNPS2, and get chatty about his upcoming mega-hit.

IGNPS2: What have you worked on at Konami before you started work on Z.O.E.?

Okamura: Well, I was the main programmer on Policenauts for the NEC PC98, 3DO, and PlayStation. I also directed Tokimeki Drama Series 1 and 2. After Metal Gear, the guys upstairs put me to work on Z.O.E.

IGNPS2: Can you give us a nutshell explanation of the Z.O.E. universe?

Okamura: Sure. For starters, Earth is overpopulated ¿ there's just way too many people living there. That's why people start to leave the planet. While there are still people on Earth, humanity is starting to branch out. There are around four million people living on Mars, and there are even more people further than that. Z.O.E. takes place on a space colony near Jupiter. This is essentially the "end of the world" ¿ the outer limit of the biosphere of human beings. This is, bar-none, the farthest place you can possibly be from Earth. It's the end of the world ¿ and that's why the people living there are referred to as the Enders. That's where we get the title!

Actually, there's an analogy here to the days of the Declaration of Independence. You've got over-saturated cultures where nothing is happening, and people are starting to migrate to North America. These pioneers are heading out with their dreams and goals, leaving their mother nation behind to be surrounded by danger. The relationship between England and Colonial America is what you see in the game ¿ the equivalent is Earth and Mars. These people are in a high-risk environment, and they're sort of poor, but they're enjoying the pioneer spirit. But it's the same situation as when England was at America's throat ¿you know, exploiting the colonies. The humans on Mars don't like the humans on Earth, and vice-versa.

So, there's this military group called Bahran ¿ some people refer to them as terrorists. What they're doing is building a secret weapon ¿ the robot you see in the game ¿ on the Jupiter colony. But both the Martians and the people on Earth want the weapon, because whoever gets it will usurp the balance of power between the three planets. The game starts with a boy ¿ the game's main character ¿ hopping on the robot which everybody is after.

IGNPS2: There are so many mech games out there ¿ you've got action-arcade games like Oratorio Tangram, and comparatively slower stuff like Armored Core. How are you going to set Z.O.E. apart from the rest of the pack?

Okamura: What I wanted to do with Z.O.E. was come up with a anime-style robot based on real scientific fact, like the laws of physics. There are a bunch of animes where they totally ignore that, which is fine ¿ it's science fiction, after all ¿ but what I wanted to do was come up with a sci-fi theme with a lot of reality infused. I wanted to see what the world would be like 150 years from now. Would a robot look like a person? Would it take a humanoid form? Whatever I came up with, I wanted it all to be backed up by solid science.

IGNPS2: Have you done much research with robotics?

Okamura: Yes, I've done a lot of research. And at the same time, we had a lot of assistance from the people who that type of scientific research for actual robot anime.

IGNPS2: You're known as the "Game scenario writer who makes you cry." What kind of emotions are we going to be experiencing as we play through Z.O.E.?

Okamura: First of all, everything is pretty much serious in this game. I wanted to come up with something that involved robots, and then the universe, and the concept of space. I worked these concepts into the storyline by writing about a world where people are living their lives very seriously ¿ the frontier people, who have left their homeland and are surrounded by peril. They have to create their own houses and their own food. Everyone's in this space environment where there's no air ¿ if you go outside into the vacuum, you're dead. You're constantly surrounded by a world of death.

IGNPS2: What did you think about the end of Evangelion?

Okamura: I personally liked it very much. I saw a lot of the creator's thoughts and philosophy in the ending.

IGNPS2: Yeah, that's been a big issue for hard-core American otaku.

Okamura: I'm not surprised (laugh).

IGNPS2: One of the aspects that makes the game seem like an interactive anime is that rocking camera system. We've never seen anything that tracks the action so well..

Okamura: We probably spent around a year working on the camera. It's, like, the thing we've been slaving away at. There are so many 3D games out there, and while 3D games are fun, there's a problem in grasping what's going on. There's just so much camera motion. In this game, I don't want you to feel like you're moving a robot that's walking around ver-ry slowly (motions), that slowly raaa-ises his arm to shoot. My goal is to realize the quick fighting action of robot animes. To do that, we've spent a lot of time getting the positions and perspectives right. Best of all, you shouldn't get motion-sickness ¿ we tried to minimize that, because I get 3D-sick a lot. (laugh)

IGNPS2: Are all the bots run by humans?

Okamura: The robots with cockpits near their, uh, groins ¿ those are the ones with people. However, the enemy you saw who looks like a skeleton, with just a spine and arms, is computer-controlled.

IGNPS2: How do the computer-controlled mechs hit into the storyline? Are these maintenance 'bots gone haywire, or are pissed-off warrior robots an accepted thing in 250 years?

Okamura: Most of them are fighting robots. I mentioned the Bahran military group ¿ since it's one of the states of Mars, there aren't a lot of actual soldiers there. So to have enough fighting robots without human pilots, they have to make some of them fully automated.

IGNPS2: Kojima-san likes to put a lot of messages into his games ¿ are there any deep, underlying morals in Z.O.E.?

Okamura: I think the message is "What is life? What is living all about?" If you slice the game in any direction, you'll run into that question. Like I had mentioned before, you're surrounded by death. There are giant robots in the game, and if a big robot swings his arm and hits a building, and if there people in the building, they're obviously gonna die! If you look at the main character, he's been bullied by his peers, and he's just not happy about life. He wouldn't care if he died tomorrow ¿ not that he's going to commit suicide or anything ¿ but he's not happy.

Then there's Viola, the arch-enemy, whose ultimate goal is to be killed on the battlefield. You've also got another girl who's on your side, and she does volunteer work, and she's very up-beat, cheerful, and optimistic. Finally, we have the AI system on-board your mech, who talks to you. It's an AI ¿ it has no life ¿ but having no life is one way to express living. So you've got a bunch of people who have different opinions towards living, and this works together in very interesting ways.

I wanted to convey all this stuff not just by showing it, but by conveying it through the game. The player is given a set of rules, where you're saving lives and fighting. For example, there's a scene where people are crying for help, but your energy is close to zero. You might say to yourself, "I wanna save these people, but since I have to fight more enemies to save them, I could be killed. Maybe if I go to another area to grab a healing item, I could get back in time to save them." Well, if the player does that, he's going to come back and see that those people are dead. There are dilemmas you face as a hero. The hero never asks for any money for saving people ¿ it's something he does for no merit, just because it's their nature. I want the player to be placed in that position, where he goes "I have to work to save these people, because if I don't, who will?"

IGNPS2: Funny you mention that ¿ that's one of the problems I have whenever I watch giant robot movies. I mean, you've got these mechs duking it out in the middle of a city and knocking shit down left and right ¿ and I'm like "Wait! Weren't there people in that fifty-story skyscraper that just got leveled?"

Okamura: (Laughs) If it makes you feel any better, the buildings you were destroying in the demo didn't have any people in them.

IGNPS2: Oh, whew.

Okamura: The thing is, buildings with people in them are marked. They have a special icon showing that they're inhabited. The reason we did that is because we didn't want to sacrifice the exhilaration of destroying buildings ¿ that's the fun part of the game! ¿ if you're constantly haunted by hundreds of people dying every time you take out a building. Let's just say there are some buildings that you don't want to destroy, but there are plenty that are open to any destructive tendencies you might have.

IGNPS2: Does the game branch off into different directions as you play, or does it follow one linear mission set?

Okamura: With Z.O.E., there's one grand story, and a given set of events that happen in a certain order. That you can't change. We wanted to avoid any branching because of the message we wanted to convey ¿ we had to do it through one story that's constant. But at the same time, there are events that you could do in different orders if you wanted to. That doesn't change the story, though.

But you never know the player. If he wants to be subversive and destroy all the buildings, the game is going to head towards a different ending. That could be considered branching. But if you work hard to save people, the robot AI starts to develop this type of personality, and starts learning about life. She wouldn't do that if you kept killing everyone.

IGNPS2: Are all of the buildings based on fast-paced battle, or will we see stealth-based missions or indoor levels?

Okamura: We can't tell you much about that, aside from the fact that you'll see a lot of variation in the maps and the missions.

IGNPS2: What are some of your favorite giant robot films?

Okamura: Gundam ¿ especially the first one ¿ is a very strong influence. We intentionally tried to include the "Gundam Essence" in the game ¿ but at the same time, we tried to recreate the old Gundam in a modern world.

IGNPS2: How long will it take the average player to blast through the game?

Okamura: If it's your first time, probably five to eight hours. We've also thrown in a versus mode, where you totally ignore the story ¿ that's a good deal of fun. The difficulty level you select effects the game, too. You earn experience points based on defeating robots. On the hardest mode, if you destroy the buildings, you start losing experience points. If you take out a structure full of people, you lose experience points that are worth two enemy robots. So the more buildings you destroy, the weaker you get ¿ if you go up a level, you could theoretically go down again if you're not careful! So it's a completely different game, and you have to conscientiously worry about preserving the game environments.

IGNPS2: So you've got some RPG influences lurking in there with the experience points.

IGNPS2: In the versus mode, can you play as the other robots you meet in the game?

Okamura: Yeah, you can choose from all the humanoid ones ¿ but not the weird bosses, like that jellyfish-creature you saw in the demo. If you choose the Raptor, which is the weakest enemy in the game, you can take on the main character's robot ¿ but you'll feel like you're like Zaku challenging Gundam! (laugh)

IGNPS2: You mentioned how you've been working on Z.O.E. for a while. Did you start development on the PSOne, or another system?

Okamura: We've been working on it for a little more than two years. We actually started developing the game on the PlayStation and the PC, but we weren't planning to release the game on those systems ¿ we knew that we were going to release the game on some next-generation machine, which turned out to be the PS2. Actually, the system we're always comparing it to is the Dreamcast. The DC is quite easy to code ¿ it's like the machine tells you "If you wanna do this, you can use this feature." It's all laid-out and it's very simple. But with the PS2, you've got this strong, powerful chip, but there are no instructions like that. You essentially have to do everything by yourself. You can get lost trying to do that. Up until the Dreamcast, programmers were coding in the C language, and that was fine. But now, with the PS2, the coders have to go back to assembler and machine language.

IGNPS2: So, are you stuck programming this one?

Okamura: Not any more! (laughs)

IGNPS2: You lucked out!

Okamura: You might say that. (laughs)

IGNPS2: Is Z.O.E. exclusive to PS2?

Okamura: We have no plans to port it to any other consoles.

IGNPS2: But is Z.O.E. 2 on the drawing board?

Okamura: Personally, I'd love to do it, but for now I have to finish the first game!

IGNPS2: Yeah ¿ but a lot of American developers automatically assume they're doing a sequel before they finish the first one!

Okamura: (Laughs) As for the story of Z.O.E., it's very open-ended in allowing a Z.O.E.2.

IGNPS2: Let's turn back the clock a bit ¿ how'd you wind up in the game industry?

Okamura: I had always wanted to work for a game company, so right after I graduated from college, I joined Konami. I had taken a year off in school and worked for a business software company, where I did programming and stuff like that. But I always wanted to work on games.

IGNPS2: But what did your parents think?

Okamura: (Laughs) My parents were actually very happy for me when I joined Konami. Konami was a public company then, so it was a well-known organization. Back then, ten years ago, Tokyo University graduates [ed. note ¿ the Japanese equivalent to Harvard grads] would never even think about working for a game company. And there was this guy ¿ my peer ¿ who had joined Konami at the same time, and he was a Tokyo University graduate! His parents were livid ¿ they were like "Why in the hell are you working for a game company?" But now there are a bunch of people from Tokyo U. at Konami, so it's not a big thing anymore.

IGNPS2: So you think the industry's getting more respect these days?

Okamura: I think so. Some of the people who join Konami surprise me, because of their great educational background. I'm always like, "Are you sure you wanna work for Konami?" It's really changed.

IGNPS2: Have you given any thoughts to the English version?

Okamura: Actually, I never thought about the US or European audience at all. I said to myself, "This is a game for the Japanese by the Japanese, and it'll never be well-received by the international market. But a few months ago we went to the US and did the English voice recordings, and the actors did a great job. When we gave them the script and showed them some footage of the game, they really dug it ¿ they thought the game looked great. When I heard that, I was like, yikes ¿ maybe the game COULD be accepted by the international market! So now I have a little more confidence (laughs).

IGNPS2: Are there any plans to include both Japanese and English voiceovers, with an option for subtitles?

Okamura: No, that won't be in there.

IGNPS2: Uh-oh! The hardcores are gonna freak out!

Okamura: The entire team loves the English voice acting. Hopefully, we could do something with it for Japan ¿ not that we have any plans for it now. Don't worry ¿ the English voice acting is really good.

IGNPS2: What kind of musical tracks will we be hearing? Will the score be interactive, like in MGS2?

Okamura: We took Mr. Kojima's suggestion of using techno-pop. In a normal situation the music is quite calm, but when you encounter an enemy, a couple of tracks are added. Once you're fighting, we add more tracks, and when you're about to be killed, there are even more. When you start defeating robots or escaping from them, we remove a few tracks and change the pitch and volume. The music really conveys the emotion of what's going on.

IGNPS2: Has Kojima-san had much influence into the game's design?

Okamura: Mr. Kojima is the producer. He's created the perfect environment where our team can create the best game we can. Nowadays, he's been giving us a lot of useful hints and tips regarding the actual development of the game.

IGNPS2: Finally, are there any messages you'd d like to give to English-speaking fans who are anxiously awaiting the game?

Okamura: When I first decided to create Z.O.E., I wanted to come up with a robot anime simulator where you actually become the main character. When you play the game, you'll feel like you're the protagonist in an anime ¿ and they'll have to face dilemmas where you have to save yourself while saving others. We think you'll enjoy it.

Much thanks to Scott Dolph, Noriaki Okamura, and the other numerous denizens of the mysterious sixth floor of the Tokyo Yebisu building.